June 23, 2009

Every year my hate meter fluctuates somewhat. Not on hating the truly repellent things, like the University of Florida, Dennis Felton's "offense," or temperance. No, the fluctuating hate is at the margins and often temporary, but it is still a quality vitriol. Here are a few things I can't forgive for their actions last year.

Alabama. - Some of you have always hated Alabama and will hate them forever. I didn't really mind them too much until last year because we had beaten them in thrilling fashion during the Richt era and they were sometimes good for a crucial win over Florida or Tennessee when the East standings were tight. This year's game set up perfectly for us: home night game, blackout, Bama showered bulletin board material at us, UF lost that afternoon, national television audience, USC lost earlier in the week, #1 was back in our grasp. It had the feeling of a coronation in pregame warm-ups. Then, this happened. Total despair. You won't endear yourself to me ever again, Bammers. On a related note ...

Being #1 Before the End of a Season. - Georgia doesn't do well as #1, unless they are hitting forehands, riding horses, or doing somersaults. Need proof? Football started the season at #1 and produced one of the most disappointing seasons we are likely to ever produce. Baseball was #1 before, and briefly during, the conference slate. They ended the year with a 3-12 streak and didn't host a regional, which appeared to be a lock half way through the year. Even the golf team, ranked #1 for almost all of the year, almost choked away a spot for match play day before falling in the final four. If we are never #1 during a season ever again, I'm OK. I'll wait until the end of the season for that ranking.

Rain - It makes the grass grow, sure, but rain really screwed us this year. First, with the SEC Baseball Tournament title in sight, the SEC umps marched Alex McRee to the mound under heavy rain in Hoover and no hope of a break in the weather. McRee gave up seven runs in the top of the first with water pouring off the bill of his cap. Then, the umps called a four hour delay and we resumed play down 7-0 without McRee. In the improved climate, LSU waltzed through the game and eventually took the title. We were still trying to dry off. It wasn't just baseball, though. In the NCAA tennis quarterfinals, the Dawgs had just finished taking the doubles point from Texas when a long line of Texas thunderstorms soaked College Station and delayed play until the next morning. Texas came out regrouped and ready. The Horns got four singles courts in route to a 4-2 win, ending the season for UGA.

Taking up every millisecond of the play clock calling meaningless audibles before punting the ball. The football equivalent to the old pitcher-fakes-to-third-then-looks-at-first trick in that IT! NEVER! FREAKING! WORKS!

Granted...I didn't experience the bathrooms in Arizona, but Columbia, SC is the worst tailgate spot in the SEC. It's about 10 degrees hotter there than anywhere else plus concrete with no shade is a bad combination.

I did read (and see a pic) of the landscaping plans they've got going on though. The place might be OK in about 25 years after the trees grow.

-Directional Kickoffs: My most annoying memory of football this year was the kick out of bounds vs Tech at the beginning of the second half

-Broken Hands: Asher would have had 4-6 picks

-Cocktail Party moving to the Dome debate: So. Sick. Of. It.

-Twitter: And I thought Facebook was bad

-Shia LaBeof: Has any guy gotten more pub and credit for doing seemingly nothing?

-Lane Kiffin: Uhhhh...I take back what I said about Shia

-Jeff Francouer: I'm done with this guy

-Arizona's tailgaiting regulations: You want to kill yourself by drinking go to Columbia the next week and sweat a gallon of liquid in 15 minutes. Other than the ovens they call bathrooms, I didn't think it was that bad out there. Columbia was like sitting in a sauna, wearing a North Face with a wool cap on your head.

-Mike Patrick, OAR, and Fresno State: Mike Patrick was already on thin ice for his Britney comment, but his coverage of the CWS was awful. I had heard of OAR but never really heard their music. Hearing "This Town" 70,000 times didn't help their case. And screw the bizarro Bulldawgs of California.

-Thompson-Boling Arena: I had never been there before but I went and saw a concert there a week or so ago and its really, really nice. I'm very jealous of that facility minus all the Orange.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego wouldn't have gotten out of those bathrooms in Tempe without heat stroke.

I'm consistent in my hatred of Mike Patrick, Emotional. I couldn't watch the CWS last night because of him. An LSU batter hit the first pitch he saw off the wall and Patrick said, "what an at bat!" Huh?

I had a bet with a Bama pal that Georgia would go winless in the SEC. Lost because of Florida. OF course. Should have known.

Though I can't be upset over that, really. Instead, I'll be twerped at the pundits who think that Billy "Coaching involves coaching? Really?" Donovan is still an elite practitioner. If you can't adjust when your full-court press is getting torched by Zac Swansey and Ricky McPhee, it's time to reevaluate your existence. Congrats on those two titles when everyone else kinda sucked, though. (08-09 UNC would beat those two squads by 20+.)

My top 3 to punch right in the face1. Urban... i am on my way to South Bend when the 4th part of the trinity leaves... Meyer2. All tech fans who forgot they got blown out in there first bowl game in a decade.3. Kirk Herbstreit...who i sat and watched him complete 3 passes against the dawgs in the 92 Citrus bowl and who by his self swung the entire media to start humping 2 loss Miles leg along with the entire LSU football program.I know short list there were some honorable mentionsLane KiffinSteve S.Paul Johnson just becauseMark MayStephen A SmithMick Hubert because he is most def gayBilly i look like Eddie Monster Donavon...only because he let Jokeim Noah act like a complete retard!

One of my friends works at the dinning halls here on campus and said that Richt and Martinez along with some other coaches were at the ECV with a HS corner today, and they told him that this kid would be the tallest corner on our team next year. Does anyone know who this CB might be?

I'll take any win we can get in the SEC. You can't play 'up' every week. A good team finds a way to win even on a bad day.

My list is:The Worldwide Leader and its talking headsThe "Corch" at F.U.The coach that runs his mouth at U.T.The coach that "doesn't cheat" at AlabamaThe coach that stirs up the nerds at Tech.Big 10 apologists12:30 kick-offs

1- Mark May2- The inablility of our D of covering the flats.3- Our KO coverage.4- Notre Dame5- USC west6- Anyone that doesn't recognize the superiority of the SEC and whats it like week after week.7- Jim Delaney of the Big 108- Penn Wagers and his crew.(I will forever blame him for last years lost after he failed to set the tone by not whistling Brandon Spikes for his laying on top of Moreno after the hit. Not to mention all the other blown calls in that game.)9- Coach Willies inability to adjust on the fly.10- CMRs blind loyalty to his assistants.Keith

I don't agree with you assertion AT ALL. But I will pretend to agree with it long enough to say this:

If the SEC is merely "a league of two powers", then that is:

1) two more powers than the Big T(elev)en

2) two more powers than the ACC

3) two more powers than the Big East

4) one more power than the PAC 1

5) the same number of powers as the Big 12

Once again, I don't agree with your assertion for one second. But even if your are right (which you are not), then the SEC still sounds pretty strong to me - even using your assertion (which was wrong).

I'm not sure what your point is. On one hand, you seem to be trying to belittle the SEC...or at least you are trying to belittle SEC fans for propagating the "myth" of SEC supremacy. On the other hand, you agree with my statements that the SEC (using your definition of strength) is superior to all other conferences except the Big 12. If so, then I hope we could agree that the SEC "non-powers" are superior (on average) to the Big 12 "non-powers". I would even go so far as to make that same point about the two powers in each conference. If we can clear that last hurdle, then we'll agree that the SEC is the toughest conference.

So what is your point then? Do you agree that the SEC is at least one of the best, but you just don't like the superior attitude of some SEC fans? Or do you seriously think the SEC is not anywhere near the best conference?

I know some fans take things to the extreme. But I don't think anyone seriously believes the bottom-feeders in the SEC are better than the elite teams in other conferences. But I'll tell you what I do believe. I believe many of those elite teams in other conferences wouldn't be quite so "elite" if they had to play eight SEC games a year.

As for your assertion that the SEC, beyond LSU and UF, is a bunch of average teams: You sure do seem to have a strange definition of “average”. Apparently, any team which has won a national championship or two in the last decade is a powerhouse, and everyone else is “average” or worse. You seem to be leaving out an entire class of teams which I call “pretty damn good, but not great”. You also are leaving out another class of teams that I’ll boringly call “above average”. The SEC has some of both of those. Over the last decade, UGA falls into the former category. Last year, Alabama and Ole Miss fell into the former category. And certainly Auburn and UT have fallen into both categories at different times over the last decade. And in any given year, I’ll take the fifth, sixth, and seventh best teams from the SEC and match them against the middling teams in any other conference. Every. Time.

So I’ll ask you again. What is your point? Are you saying the SEC is pretty good but not as good as some fans think? Or are you saying some other conference is clearly better? If so, who?

Me? I’m not saying the SEC is the best conference by a mile every single season. But I am saying it has been the best conference by a mile during some recent seasons. And some seasons it is merely “one of the best”. But that is still more than any other conference can say about the last decade or so.

My point is the SEC is a similar conference to every other power conference. It has two great teams and a large number of average teams.

What is the combined SEC record against the Big 10 over the past 10years in the Capital One and Outback bowls? I use those two bowls becasue they pit an SEC team againts a Big 10 team every single year. Also, both bowls aren't taking the very best teams from each league so it gives you a good indication of how the average teams in each conference match up head to head.

I do believe the SEC's two power teams are better than any other two teams from the other conferences.

Regarding those two bowls...they aren't always a matchup of equivalently ranked teams.

In the case of the CapOne Bowl, they purportedly take the Big 10 #2 team and the SEC #2 team. But the truth is that they get the first choice after the BCS bowls. Since the SEC frequently has two teams in BCS bowls, you sometimes get Big10 #2 versus SEC #3 (or worse if they pick a team based on ticket sales rather than pure merit).

In the case of the Outback Bowl, you almost always get a mismatch of ranks. The Big 10 #3 sometimes ends up going against the SEC #5 or worse - once again based on whether the SEC team was chosen on merit or ticket-selling ability. The fact that South Carolina went last year should tell you all you need to know about the selection process. I think we can agree that they have NEVER been the SEC #3 team...or #4...or#5...

Now you might say I'm quibbling, and you might be right. But I still say the middling SEC teams will beat the middling teams from the Big 10 or any other BCS conference. The strength of a conference schedule shows up in the not-so-sexy teams. I hope we can agree that the South Carolina and Arkansas types would usually have beaten the Illinois and Purdue types over the last decade.

Other than that, it is probably time to just politely disagree. You'll never get me to agree that the SEC is "similar to every other power conference" - especially since you never answered my direct question about which conference(s) is/are better than the SEC. And your definition of "average" still defies anything that you would ever find in a dictionary - another point you didn't want to address even though I asked you specifically to do so.

However, I would like to thank you for making your points without using the word "sux". That was refreshing, at least. Until we meet again...

Uhhh...no. It wasn't "the whole it's the match-ups argument". It was a very specific argument in which I made several very specific points - none of which you refuted.

You seem like a decent enough person who loves college football and who can form an intelligible sentence. I'd like to think I'm the same sort of person. It is OK if we don't agree. But I've made my best attempt to address your points in a thorough and systematic way, while you've repeatedly refused to address mine in any sort of way - systematic or otherwise. So if you aren't going to (at a minimum) answer specific questions which have been posed multiple times, then my time will be better spent elsewhere.

No, I won't be detailing any games over the last decade for you. If you want me to do that, you'll have to thoroughly address about a dozen points and answer several specific questions first. See 12:29 and 2:36 for details. I'll check back Monday to see if you did it successfully. If you have, I'll be pleased to continue our discussion. If not, then I will treat it as Strike 4 (I guess I'm feeling generous today). Have a good weekend!

You two main questions seem to be who do I feel is superior to the SEC?

&

How do I define average teams?

First, I don't think there is a conference superior to the SEC. I also don't think the SEC is superior over any of other power conferences. My whole point is that, save the 2 power teams, the conferences are all pretty much even (which is proven by the facts I cited with the 2 bowls).

As far as my definition of average I was bascially lumping all teams not deemed super powers together (yes, lazy on my part). Every conference is going to have teams that fall into different different levels. My only point is that after the 2 top teams in the SEC the rest of the league is about the same as every other leauge.

Please let me know if there is any other specific point you'd like me to address. If not, please show me where the Big 10 had such a huge advantage over the SEC in either the Capital One or Outback bowls.

Whi limit it to these two bowls? The citrus na doutback or hardly ever the 2 & 3 teams, as the west generally will get a cotton bowl for their #2 non BCS team.

If the only argument supporting the Big 11(11) is these bowls then you may have a point. But if you include all head to head match ups between the Big 10 and SEC and the conference records against same opponents, I would expect it begins to tilt heavily towards the SEC, atleast with regards to the Big 10.